The OSP donated 32 Worthless radios ?

j0atm0n · Jun 14, 2016

So basically.. the OSP is donating old Marcs radio's to agencies that already is on the new Marcs IP system ?

Local law enforcement receives radio donation from Ohio State Hi - Hometownstations.com-WLIO- Lima, OH News Weather Sports

The article reads :

"The Ohio State Highway Patrol donated 32 radios to local law enforcement. The highway patrol upgraded their radio services, and donated their radios that were no longer compatible to the Lima Police Department and Allen County Sheriff's Office.

Lieutenant Colonel Kevin Teaford says the radios are compatible with all law enforcement in the area and range statewide. Teaford says good communication is crucial for safety, referencing how difficult it was working with low quality radios when he first became a trooper. "You're lucky if you had a scanner in your car, you could hear other officers talking and you might just be across, around a block, so what these radios communications will mean for this community is our troopers will be able to communicate directly with the sheriff's deputies and the police officers, and that's a huge officer safety, if there's a call for help they're going to know about it, we're going to know about it."

Teaford says each radio costs more than four thousand dollars."

trumpetman · Jun 14, 2016

The radios in the video are XTS5000s, which if flashed appropriately can be optioned for P25 phase I which will work just fine for MARCS-IP.

j0atm0n · Jun 14, 2016

So then if :
"Teaford says each radio costs more than four thousand dollars."
why didn't they just flash them and use them as back up spares / special event radios ?
doesnt make sense, or at least it doesn't to me.

there's still agencies in the same area that never upgraded to the old marcs , why not donate them to those agencies ....

trumpetman · Jun 14, 2016

Could be several reasons.

-Maybe they wanted to give away more radios to agencies they work with a lot to allow for better communications.
-Maybe they're moving towards a different radio make/model and want to standardize parts for repair.
-Maybe they no longer have the spare parts while the other departments they're donating to do have parts.

I've seen it go several ways. With the radios being EOL and support ending in the coming years, it may be a stepping stone towards getting smaller departments radios since they don't have as big of a budget as OSP. If Motorola isn't doing a buy-back, and you can afford new radios, why waste the money on flash upgrades when you can just give the radios away and let another department spend the money it takes to buy a single radio and upgrade the options for 4 or 5 radios.

BusterCMH · Jun 15, 2016

OSP is upgrading all troopers to APX multi band radios to accommodate their new cross band mobile extenders.

wa8pyr · Jun 15, 2016

Hardly worthless

The donated radios are anything but worthless. OSP is moving to APX multi-band portables compatible with their new vehicle repeaters, and since the old radios are perfectly good and capable of operating on the new system, they're being donated to departments in need.

These radios are still supported through the end of 2018, and after that will still be repaired as long as parts are available. A radio that's well made and well cared for will last many years, available support or not, so they'll still be around for many years.

W8VFD · Jun 15, 2016

My XTS5000 works just fine on MARCS-IP, I believe as long as they have 9600 baud trunking in their flash code they'll work just fine.

jscott02 · Jun 15, 2016

W8VFD said:
My XTS5000 works just fine on MARCS-IP, I believe as long as they have 9600 baud trunking in their flash code they'll work just fine.

That's my understanding as well. Maybe Tom can chime in.

phask · Jun 28, 2016

Zanesville just received 50 of these "worthless" radios. And were happy to get them.

https://www.whiznews.com/content/ne...ay-patrol-donates-radios-to-zanesville-police

durango5550 · Jun 30, 2016

keep in mind that when MARCS-IP goes phase two , not every radio or agency will have to be phase 2. OSP may go phase 2 ( seeings how they are using APX which is capable ) but lets say for example corrections agency all still use XTS portables (which are not phase 2 compliant) they will still be able to use the MARCS-IP system. So these radios are far from "useless"

firecatohio · Jun 30, 2016

so what models are phase 2 complaint then? xts should be

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wa8pyr · Jul 1, 2016

firecatohio said:
so what models are phase 2 complaint then? xts should be

In the Motorola product line, only the APX series. XTS/XTL are not.

firecatohio · Jul 1, 2016

Go figure.. bought a xts2500 to use when we switch over but now I'm holding a useless radio.. thank god in only spent 100 on it lol

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medic611 · Jul 2, 2016

There's reason those radios cost a few thousand vs a few hundred dollars. Hocking is soon to be joining MARCS on a trial basis with a vhf vehicle repeater, similar to what ACEMS used...

Nasby · Jul 2, 2016

firecatohio said:
Go figure.. bought a xts2500 to use when we switch over but now I'm holding a useless radio.. thank god in only spent 100 on it lol

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MARCS IP is Phase 1 not Phase 2.

So your $100 XTS will work.

Likely for a long time.

firecatohio · Jul 2, 2016

trying to figure out what system hocking is doing haven't asked anyone

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W8RMH · Jul 2, 2016

firecatohio said:
trying to figure out what system hocking is doing haven't asked anyone

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Hocking County shows numerous talkgroups on MARCS-IP in the database. There is money out there in grants and Homeland Security funds to pay for radios.

durango5550 · Jul 8, 2016

The switch to phase 2 , Likely won't happen for some time. Even if it does , again not all entities will have to switch. The system will be capable of running phase 1 and phase 2.

W8RMH · Jul 8, 2016

durango5550 said:
The switch to phase 2 , Likely won't happen for some time. Even if it does , again not all entities will have to switch. The system will be capable of running phase 1 and phase 2.

Also as long as at least 1 radio on that talk group is Phase 1 then all transmissions will be Phase 1.

durango5550 · Jul 10, 2016

W8RMH said:
Also as long as at least 1 radio on that talk group is Phase 1 then all transmissions will be Phase 1.

Where is the like button when ya need one.

The OSP donated 32 Worthless radios ?

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